Mepaco Blog

Reliable by Design

Mepaco's screw conveyors are engineered to the requirements of the food processing application. In the photo, these screw conveyors transported pet food. The conveyor in the foreground was placed after the grinder and transported ground product. The conveyor in the background was utilized before the grinder. It featured a trough design that handled large meat chunks, which fed the grinder.

Engineers work closely with the customer's production experts to design systems that minimize space while maximizing flexibility for product formulations and production goals.

A Pet Food Processor needed to increase throughput due to production delays in waiting for grinders feeding directly to blenders.

Solution

Mepaco engineered a solution that placed surge loaders between the grinder and the blender, allowing the processor to accumulate and stage a full batch of products to be fed into the blender. This system allows the processor to select different volumes of products from a fresh grinder and a frozen block grinder, and feed them together into the surge loader. As soon as the downstream blender is empty, the surge loader quickly refills the blender to begin the next batch.

An integral piece of equipment is the Screw Elevator. This equipment was designed with CIP (clean-in-place) spray ball. It features a fixed based with an elevated pivot track to reduce sanitation time.

Another vital piece of equipment are the specialty loaders. These hoppers were designed with extended side walls for high capacity loading.

Product staging and storage was a key factor in getting the maximum throughput from this grind/blend system. This solution saves valuable minutes off each batch that would be spent waiting if the grinders were to directly feed a blender.

Mepaco, part of Apache Stainless, is known for grinding and blending systems. Equipment products, which are customized for the application, include thermal processing solutions, mixers, blenders, cookers, augers, dumpers, sanitary conveyors and material handling systems.

Mepaco has recently published a new white paper, "Comparing Agitator Solutions for Food Processing Applications". The paper, developed in collaboration with sales, engineering and applications teams, is a guide for agitation solutions in Cookers, Mixers, Blenders and Drop Tanks.

In the white paper, there are many details about the technology of agitators, highlighting: ribbon, paddle, combination and double agitator applications.

A new "CLICK BOOK" brochure has been created to showcase Mepaco's animations and videos on equipment and systems for food processing.

This interactive brochure has links to various system demonstrations, brochures, blogs and videos. Users simply click on the play button or information button specific to the piece of equipment or system.

This solution reduces food waste and eliminates the need for personnel to have to manually clear product.

The Clean Sweep Surge Loader has been engineered for prepared foods, ground or trim meat products. The design is modified to meet the requirements of the application. Some of the options include different agitator configurations, customized safety grating, load cells, pneumatic covers on the screw conveyor discharge and electropolished food contact surfaces.

Now playing at the Mepaco's IPPE Booth B4853 are several system videos and 3D animations that showcase Pre-Blend Systems, Grind Blend Systems and Accumulation Systems. Mepaco's entire sales team will be at the IPPE show to answer questions on how to increase production, yields and product integrity.

Mepaco provides a custom system approach to customer plant and processing requirements that includes immediate and long-term performance goals, as well as sanitation and safety requirements. Our equipment includes grinders, mixers, blenders, vacuum pumping units, hoppers, loaders, screw and belt conveyors and dumpers.

We strive to be a strategic partner with a team of long-standing, experienced engineers and project managers who work with you on your specific application. Our equipment designs are modified to specific requirements to meet customer product, safety and sanitation goals. We are a complete SOLID WORKS 3D capable engineering design team.

Also as a strategic partner, Mepaco has in-house controls capabilities with the latest in software and device technology to bring the best results in process and material handling systems. Customers can expect UL listed industrial control panel design and assembly, as well as UL listed stainless NEMA 4 enclosures, allowing Mepaco to provide controls programming and integration with your system.

The Mepaco team understands how valuable production uptime is to your company's bottom line. We are evolving our service team to provide quick response commissioning, ramp-up, maintenance, repair, and emergency break-down support.

Designed by the Mepaco group, this system (above video) was engineered to formulate ground meats. It addresses the customer's production goals for speed, flexibility and accuracy with the utmost attention to a safe and sanitary design. In addition, the system provides efficient transfers that reduce transport time and eliminates transfer issues that result in lost yields.

Highlighted in the video animation:

Our Clean-Sweep surge loader provides added surge to aid in the turn-over of batches while its unique design eliminates product harborage and completely cleans out between batches.

The two-tier conveyor belt with integrated metal detector flips the trim for further visual inspection of contaminants.

Pivoting drop-down conveyors are designed to pivot between required processes and lower for easier sanitation.

Our overlapping paddle mixer-blenders and mixer-grinders provide a quick and accurate blend with minimal temperature rise. The dual pre-blend system is equipped with vacuum sampling capability for testing lean-point for accurate formulation.

This system (see video link) was designed to increase capacity and flexibility for processing sauces and soups for a commercial food manufacturer.

The Column Dumper feeds the ThermaBlendTM Cooker with recipe ingredients. The 200 gallon ThermaBlendTM with heat transfer jacket, cooks the product while being gently agitated by dual ribbons.

After the batch is cooked, it is released into a drop tank which is jacketed for maintaining temperature and includes an agitator for continued dispersion of particulates. The batches are then pumped to downstream packaging operations.

The sanitary design platform allows safe and easy access for maintenance and sanitation.

For maximum flexibility, the system allows for two different batch processes or doubling batches to accommodate production demands.